When I woke on the fourth morning of our sea journey, my head felt clear and my legs were steady. After bathing and changing into fresh clothes, I made my way to the main deck.
It was a smallish ship. The passengers, servants and crew were not segregated as they are on larger ocean going vessels. I found Maggie engaged in a conversation with a young crew man of dark complexion. So dusky was his color that I was not surprised to discover that his mother was a native of the continent to which we were sailing. However, I was surprised to hear Maggie chattering to him in a language with which I was not familiar.
"I have an ear for languages," Maggie explained. "Samuel here has been teaching me a bit of African. I thought it might come in useful." Her tone was apologetic, as if she thought that I would disapprove. Disapprove of what? That she was talking to a sailor, a young man with an african mother? Or disapprove that she was more clever than a girl of her class was supposed to be?
"There is no single African language," Samuel corrected. His english was perfect. "This dialect is but one of many. But it should do where you are going." He stared at me with open curiosity.
"I hope you don't mind, Miss,"" Maggie interjected quickly. "I told him about the mission you are building. And about the trunk full of Bibles."
It took me a moment to catch onto the lie. The so called "trunk of Bibles" was in fact a trunk full of books. Their subjects ranged from the continent we were about to visit to China and from China to the Americas. There were books of philosophy and poetry. Books of science, books of theology. There were even a couple of books dealing with the black arts. In the past year and three months I had developed an interest in such unwholesome subjects. "The Bibles. Yes. Are they safe?" It was not a complete lie. Somewhere among the books there were two Bibles, one King James, the other Catholic. I had brought them for reference. I would have to remember to dig one of them out and start carrying it in my reticule, like a proper missionary.
Maggie bobbed her red head. "Quite safe, Miss. Now, if you have no need for me, I will be seeing to the laundry."
That night, as I opened my steamer trunk to remove a nightdress, I caught a glimpse of the embroidered cloth that concealed my Intended's final present to me. Sent by a special courier of the Company, it arrived three months, two weeks and four days before before his death.
I had ceased to fear the contents of the package. Now, when I unfolded the heavy cloth it was not out of morbid curiosity. I knew every detail of my Intended's gift, the idol carved of wood, its head thrown back, its full lips parted in a mocking laugh, one arm raised above its shoulder as if to throw a spear, the other close to its side, its torso studded with nails and bits of iron, its navel sealed with wood, cotton and twine as if to say "There are secrets here, in this place which is the source of life, the umbilicus that links one human generation to the next like pearls upon a strand."
In the year and three months since its arrival upon England's shore, that little idol had spoken to me with a clarity and honesty which I had never heard before. Not from the mouth of the male of my species, anyway. It told me "Why do you wait for him to send you scraps? Are you not hungry for more? Is not the Heart of Africa bounteous enough to feed one extra woman?"
When I hesitated, it whispered "Do not be afraid, little sister. See the nails which they have driven into my woody flesh? Do I cry out or flinch in pain? No, I throw my head back and laugh for joy no matter how they use me. No matter how many wishes they demand or spells they attempt to cast, their longing and their greed only make me more powerful. More whole.
"We are alike you and I, though you are a woman, tall and pale from the cold north, and I am a twisted little man made of dark wood carved from the trunk of an African tree. Those who seek more than life has to offer are drawn to us, they fall at our feet, they raise their hands in supplication, they make promises--and then they seal the bargain with a dagger, a nail, a wedding band, a kind lie. Why? Because we are the source of magic, the well of dreams. We are its dark heart, you and I. And if they could, they would devour us whole."
I folded the little idol back into his pouch of heavy cloth. The exotic fabric never ceased to amaze me. Such a brilliant shade of coral red with threads of something that gleamed like gold. There was nothing in England to compare with that color, except for a rare sunset. And a woman could not clothe herself in sunset, not in Britain anyway.
But in Africa...
Maggie seemed to enjoy herself on the journey south, making friends easily with the crew members and other servants. In contrast, I kept to myself. My mourning clothes and veil were like armor. They said to the world "Leave me to my misery." Since most people have enough sorrow of their own, no one tried to intrude upon mine. I spent most of my journey writing in my journal and reviewing my books about Africa.
The texts were woefully lacking. Most of them discussed the customs of tribes to the north or south of the region where my Intended died. From the differences between these two groups, I surmised that Africa was much like Europe and that a knowledge of the Berbers would be of as little use to me as a book on the Belgians would be to someone planning to visit Rome.
When I was not reading, I recorded my thoughts in the journal which I had begun keeping. My Intended was not on my mind as much as people might have imagined from my widow's garb. For some reason, I found myself thinking more often of the man sent by the Company to tell me of my fiance's death than of my fiance himself.
He had lied to me. When Marlowe said "His last words were...your name," I knew that he was lying. I covered my face and pretended to cry so that he would not see the doubt in my eyes, the bitter twist of my lips or the angry flare of my nostrils. How dare he lie to protect me? How dare he patronize me?
And yet, what else was he to do? I had not told him the truth. My widow's weeds, my mournful voice, the gold band on my left fourth finger--these were no less lies than Marlowe's final words. Men are so easily manipulated. Clutch a handkerchief and sniff back an imaginary tear, and they will do anything, tell you anything in order to set the fairy tale right.
He told me what he thought I wanted to hear. From this I deduced that my Intended's final words were of such a nature that no man would repeat them to a flower of english womanhood. This knowledge fortified me. I had resolved to carry out my scheme and see for myself what lay at the heart of Africa.
Maggie had more luck at learning what lay ahead of us in Africa. Her sailor friend, Samuel grew up on ships--his father was a captain-- and he had been to Africa a number of times. Also, his mother had told him stories of her people. From him, Maggie learned that the slave trade was still thriving, though now the captives were taken north for the most part, to be sold to the Turks. She learned that the so called "savage" tribes had lived in their homeland for thousands of years, growing the same crops that their ancestors grew, following the same rules, observing the same religious feasts. Very few were cannibals. Indeed, Samuel believed that those few who claimed to be cannibals were lying because it was understood that the Europeans were afraid of cannibals.
"Though," as Maggie said, "why the soldiers, armed with their guns should be more afraid of teeth that have chewed human flesh than teeth which have chewed only animal flesh is a mystery to me."
Maggie made me feel very old and dull sometimes. She was like a spark of light which renewed itself with its own fire. In contrast, I was like a shadow. When surrounded by people and noise and distractions, I faded to nothing.
However, when I paced the deck alone at night, peering up at the stars or down at the white flecked waves--then I felt the power inside me. There was a dark place within me that burned, in its own way, no less brightly than Maggie.
As I feared, the coast of Africa almost proved to be Maggie's undoing. The first time we saw a white man beating a black man, I thought that she would grab the whip and turn it on the one who had wielded it. However, growing up in Ireland, she must have seen atrocities almost as bad. I felt her take charge of her anger, grab it by the horns and wrestle it into submission.
"Miss," she whispered harshly into my ear. She reached into her reticule. "Here is your Bible. Perhaps it is time to use it."
I had kept up Maggie's convenient lie. When a lady in black tells the world that she has been called by God to convert the savages, the world may shake its head in private and call her mad, but aloud it proclaims her a heroine. After all, was that not our avowed purpose for being here in the Dark Continent? To educate, to reform, to save?
I took the leather bound Bible that Maggie offered me. Raising it over my head, I approached the master and servant. I had no idea what I would say, but when I opened my mouth the words poured out, a mixture of New Testament and common sense tied together with a thread of righteousness at once so delicate but so strong that the man holding the whip let his weapon drop to his side and stood there, mute and pale while his servant seized the opportunity to sprint away.
"'Blessed are the merciful!' Have you forgotten the parable of the master who forgave his servant's debt? You are that servant. Your Lord has freed you from your debt of sin, and how do you repay him? You grab your servant by the neck and demand that he repay his debt to you in flesh and blood. But beware! 'Then his lord said unto him "O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me: Should thou not also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on you?"
"Repent or find yourself damned. Not to hellfire. Not to the whim of Satan. Your punishment shall be far worse. The evil you wreak upon the earth will seek you out when you are least prepared. You will rise one morning and look at your face in the mirror and there you will see the face of he who lashed Our Lord Jesus Christ and then nailed him to a cross. And as it dawns on you that this most hated of faces is yours, you will know the ultimate despair..."
There was quite a crowd gathered by the time Maggie took my arm and interrupted me with a whispered "When we get back to England you should take up preaching."
The trance was broken. My mouth closed. As the words stopped flowing, I felt a rush of embarrassment tinged with just a touch of worry. My Intended had possessed a skill with words. It was that which first drew me to him. However, if my suspicions were correct, he had used his talents for unworthy ends.
That is the danger of words. They can be twisted into meanings for which they were never intended, put to uses which God or the human mind or whoever or whatever it was that created the talking ape never predicted. Words can tell deep truths, but they can tell terrible lies, too. Like the words that Marlowe spoke to me. His words were like a magic spell. With them, he would have imprisoned me forever in a tower of glass, a fairy tale princess with no hope of escape except for death.
Thank God I now know how to see through lies. Or should I be thanking the little carved idol? Is there a difference?
My hand trembles as I write this last bit of blasphemy. But no thunderbolt appears to knock my pen from my hand. The earth beneath my feet does not split to swallow me up.
Outside, they are hanging a man. The fact of his dying was bad enough for me, but Maggie, being herself, had to find out more.
"It is a native man. A servant. He struck a officer," she told me. Her green eyes were ablaze with angry fire. "He struck an officer when the officer tried to take his woman. Now they are taking his life.The woman is dead, at her own hands, because she has been defiled."
Oh, it is too much. The dark place within my heart aches to hear it. I want to close my eyes and hide my head and dream it all away. But there is no dreaming away Maggie's anger. It is a beacon, a light in the darkness. It will make itself seen whether the world wishes it or not.
Not for the first time, I wonder if I should insist that Maggie remain here on the coast while I make the journey up the river. Before, I had worried for her safety. Now, it is a different fear that gives me pause. If such horrors exists here, in a place where there is sunshine and people to see, what is happening inland? If Maggie can barely restrain her fury now, what will happen when we reach the dark heart of the continent?
And now I tremble. For the little statue which sits on the table beside me tells me truths which I do not want to hear. He tells me "Maggie is here for a reason. You know that. You want to see what she will do. You want to unleash her fury on all that is evil in the world."
Could it be true? I search my heart and find only pity. I want to blanket the world in the gentle darkness of night so that each injured soul can mend its wounds. Can it be that my heart is lying to me? No, the darkness is no lie. It is as real as the hand which clutches this pen, as real as the words upon this page--
But could it be that there are two truths? That one is the darkness which heals and soothes and the other is a blazing sword?
I am so confused. Even words do not calm me as they usually do. I will go for a walk. I will take my Bible, a book which I no longer believe. Strange how it is more valuable to me now than it was during those years when I fought its tyranny. Now that I know that it is nothing but paper and words, I see it for the useful tool it is. With the Bible held before me like an olive branch, they must listen to me. I will go down to the place where they have hanged a man for loving his wife too much, and I will speak.
"'Think not that I have come to send peace on earth; I come not to send peace but a sword...'"
Afterwards, Maggie is worried for my safety. "People who lie to themselves that they do evil things for good reasons--those people do not care to hear the truth. They like their lies. Their lies let them sleep easy at night. I think we had better be away from here."
She no longer calls me "Miss" or asks my permission to do things. It is now clear which of us is charge. I sit here, writing meaningless words in my journal while she packs our possessions and arranges for native men to carry out trunks through the jungle to the steamer which awaits us on the river.
Part of me is aware of the physical discomfort of Africa, the heat, the humidity, the mosquitoes, the stench. But that part of me seems very far away now. The part of me which used to care what people thought of me--I think I left that behind in England. It must have been mixed with the breakfast which I vomited into the cold, northern water. When women look at me and shake their heads, I feel pity for them. When men look at me and mutter, I feel pity for them, too.
"It is time to leave," Maggie says.
I blink my eyes. In the doorway there stands a fine looking young man, with short curly red hair, dressed in khaki trousers, a white shirt and a jacket covered with pockets.
I blink again. "Is that you, Maggie?"
She deepens her voice. "I'll be going by the name of Jim for a bit. Jim, your younger brother. Come." She holds out her arm. Her shoulders are thrown back, her chin is held high and proud. When I lay my fingers lightly on her forearm, it is masculine strength that I feel there. At the moment, Maggie looks capable of carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. And she would carry it lightly, too. For her it would not be the heavy lead weight which seems to be buried deep within the soft, dark center of my heart.
The jungle is beautiful. I never want to leave. Sometimes I pause to stare into the eyes of a brightly colored bird or gaze at a lovely crimson flower.
Once, I found myself eye to eye with a green snake. Its tongue flickered as it tasted--no, smelled the flesh of my outstretched hand. Snakes smell things with their tongues. I read that somewhere. You can learn a lot from books, but you can not learn what it is like to stare into the eyes of a snake and know another creature and know also that it knows you.
After several minutes, the snake turned and slithered away. I looked up. The natives were staring at me, eyes wide with fear and something more, something like awe. Maggie was as pale as a sheet. She can talk to natives easily using the language Samuel taught her. She translated for me. "The men say that snake is poisonous. One bite can kill an ox."
"I know," I replied calmly. It was true. Even before she spoke the words, I understood that the serpent's bite would be deadly. But I also understood something that she, for all her intelligence could never know. The snake would not bite me. How did I know? Does it matter? Is not the knowledge enough?
The jungle is the most beautiful place that I have ever seen. Sometimes it seems to me that I have always been here, and my life before, my girlhood in England, my engagement, the death of my Intended, the ocean voyage--all of these were just the dreams which an embryo uses to while away the time until he is born.
The jungle gives way to the River.
The River is wide and deep and dark, like my heart. It cools the air and soothes the spirit with its gentle motion and sound. Immediately, I am drawn to it. I stand at the water's edge and look down. There, amid the reeds and tiny fish stands a woman dressed in black. Her face is veiled. I throw back the flimsy fabric and see a face as pale as death. No wonder they fear us. We wear our skulls outside our skin. We are death made flesh.
It is fortunate for me that I have Maggie to tell me what to do. She guides me up the ramp that leads onto the steamer. She sees to our luggage. She pays the servants and offers them a few words of advise in their own tongue. They are friendly with Maggie. They talk easily to her. Me, they watch with hooded eyes. If I stare directly at them, they look away quickly and make gestures with their hands to ward off evil.
I see one of our servants talking to one of the steamer's crew. His skin is as black as coal except for a pink patch of vitiligo on one cheek. He glances at me, just once, but it is enough for me to know that they are talking about me. What is the porter telling the sailor? That I am mad? The thought makes me smile. Indeed, I am mad. Just as my countryman, William Blake was mad.
I recall that one of my many books is a collection of Blake's poetry. I hurry towards our cabin where I throw open my trunk of books, searching until I find the slender volume I seek.
Words are useful tools. With words a world of lies can be created, but words can also tear apart the lies. That is when words cease to be merely tools of communication and become magic in themselves.
How strange. I have travelled a thousand miles to another continent to discover a truth that was there all the time.
I spend most of my time reading, which gives credence to Maggie's story that I am a widowed missionary. There are no other women on board. Now I see the wisdom of Maggie's masquerade. One woman accompanied by her brother is odd enough to excite conversation. Two women would have been a cause for panic.
One older gentleman, a soldier with a heavy moustache and mutton chop whiskers, has taken it upon himself to be my protector and adviser. "Your brother is very clever for a boy. But he is still just a boy. He knows the native tongue as well as any white man I have met, but he does not yet know the native ways. He still thinks that we can deal with them on equal terms. He believes that if we speak with the voice of reason they will hear."
"And what would the voice of reason tell them, Sergeant Blackthorpe, if it were to speak?" I ask cooly.
"Why, it would tell them that they have the opportunity to lift themselves out of the darkness. In a generation, they can gain what it took europeans a thousand years to acquire."
"And what is that?" I inquire.
If I were a man, he might suspect me of baiting him. Since I am a woman, he merely thinks me stupid. "Civilization, of course. The bright and shining beacon of civilization."
At that moment my own bright and shining beacon appears. I am so used to seeing her in her masculine garb that I can not imagine her dressed any other way. She pretends to be friendly with the Sergeant, but I know the truth. In private she has said terrible things about him. I am not surprised when she makes up an excuse to get me away from him.
"He is harmless--" I start to say.
Maggie rolls her eyes. "He is a butcher. Do you know what this steamer is carrying?"
Is this a trick question? "It is carrying us."
She shakes her head impatiently. In a whisper "No, its cargo. The hold is loaded with weapons. Weapons and explosives. To reinforce the inland troops."
"Oh." What else can I say? Weapons and explosives have no function in the warm, dark place where I now exist. Weapons and explosives are part of Maggie's world. Let her deal with them.
Later, when I retire to my cabin for an afternoon nap, the wooden statue grins up at me. "Are you not the least bit curious to see how she will deal with them?" he seems to ask.
"Why should I be curious?" I answer. "In time, all will be revealed."
I am mad. Quite mad. It is a very comfortable feeling.
I find our River journey less satisfying than our trek through the jungle. It takes me almost the entire journey to realize why this is so. I can see the water. I can smell the moist, green scent of wet vegetation . When the engine is idle, I can hear the sound of waves lapping against the sides of the boat. But I can not touch The River, and it can not touch me. To know something, you must be able to touch it, to feel it, to be it. You must put your life in its hands, and you must hold its beating heart in your own.
If not for the steamer, I could be at one with the River. All I have to do is stand at the stern and take a step--
It is not the Sergeant who calls me back. It is not Maggie, dear, sweet, brave Maggie. It certainly is not the "mission". Even writing the word makes me smile. No, it is none of these that makes me pause with my foot above the water. It is the little carved statue of a man. I need to see the place which gave birth to him. I need to meet his creator. I need to strip off my widows weeds and wrap my body in the setting sun. Only then can it begin--
What? What will begin? Reading the words which I have written in my journal gives me a headache. I must stop looking backwards. As our steamer fights against the current of the River, dragging us ever deeper inland, so must I resist the pull of madness which threatens to unmoor me.
But my dreams--ever since we came to the River, I have had such dreams. Some faces are dark, others pale. Some dress in strange clothing. Others wear nothing at all. There are rifles and weapons worse than rifles, machines that spit fire, cannons that can held comfortably in a man's arms, green fruit that explodes taking with it the hand or the arm of the one who holds it, yellow vapors that cause the eyes to bleed and the flesh to peel. And there is blood, so much blood. How can a dream contain so much blood? In life, that much blood would cause the oceans of the world to spill over their beaches and civilization as we know it would come to an end.
"And this is a bad thing?" the little idol asks.
"Without civilization, there is chaos," I whisper.
"Chaos is what happens when civilization meets civilization."
"You are confusing me," I complain .
Is it just my imagination or does his grin widen? "Good. For a while I was afraid that you were not listening ."
"The jungle is too quiet," the Sergeant says. "By now the natives should have made at least one attack. Poisoned darts at the very least." His eyes narrow. "They are up to something."
Maggie is up to something. I can tell from the lightness of her step. Several times I catch her speaking in a low voice to the crew member with the pink scar on his cheek. She pays no attention to me, but if the sergeant or one of his soldiers happens by, she breaks off the conversation immediately.
What is she up to? I do not ask, because I know that she will not tell me. Or could it be that I do not ask because I am afraid that she might tell me?
She tells me other things. She tells me about her older brother who was tied to the back of a carriage and dragged to his death by the man who owned her father's farm in Ireland. No one in her family ever learned what crime if any the young man was guilty of. She tells me about about a dozen youths hanged in a day for "conspiring against the crown." She tells me about babies dying from hunger. And as she speaks of Ireland, her eyes tell me more.
Could it be that she has already told me what she intends to do but there is a part of me which refuses to hear? Can we know something and still pretend not to know? If we refuse to acknowledge what we know, does that make it less true?
I wish that Mr. Marlowe was here. I would like to discuss the question with him. He hesitated for a moment before he told me the lie. That is good. It would have been better if he had told the truth, but even the hesitation was something. He considered what he was doing. He debated the options. Any other man would have lied without a moment's pause. Mr. Marlowe was onto something, just as my Intended was onto something. What held them back? What made them turn their faces away from the truth? Was it too dark for them to bear?
Maybe, when I stand face to face with the darkness, I will know. Maybe, I will go mad. Maybe I am already mad, and when I face the darkness I will go sane.
No one except Maggie knows that Kurtz was my Intended. As we near the compound, the men begin to speak of him, first in whispers, then more loudly. They do not talk openly in my presence, but I am so quiet and dark in my widow's weeds that I merge into the shadows. Often they forget that I am there.
"...saw it with my own eyes. Human corpses piled up beside a giant cooking pot. Skulls used for goblets. Cracked human thigh bones, the marrow sucked out..."
"... a native woman. Some kind of princess. They used to strip off their clothes and paint themselves with blood.."
"...children butchered. There are limits. Even when dealing with savages, there are limits. He went too far..."
The speaker is wrong. My Intended did not go too far. He did not go far enough. He went only half way. He found himself standing on the shore of a strange land and he panicked. Where am I, he asked? What is this place? Since he had no words for it, he called it Evil, because it was easier to be Evil than to be Nameless.
I recall the mulatto sailor's story. The British fear cannibals. We are afraid that the dark heart of this continent will gobble us up. My Intended was afraid, too. Being an extraordinary man he decided that he would devour the continent, but instead, he ended up devouring himself.
Tears run down my cheeks as I think of how it must have been for him. When simple cannibalism no longer inspired feelings of disgust within him, did he seek worse crimes? Is that why he murdered children? Is that why he put human heads on pikes around the perimeter of the camp? Not to frighten away intruders but to frighten himself, to make himself feel something that he could put a name to? Better Evil than Nameless.
How sad. How pitifully sad.
Tonight I stood on the deck of our steamer. I could feel eyes within the darkness of the jungle watching me, measuring me. Like the green snake, the owner of those eyes could have killed me with a single dart, but she did not. Yes, she. It is a woman who watches me. It is a woman who makes sure that no one on our steamer is harmed. Not because she gives a damn what happens to the men on board our ship--no, she would gladly consign them all to Hell. She wants to protect Maggie. I can understand why. What I do not comprehend is why she wants to protect me.
I have a book in my hand, a Bible. One by one I tear out the pages and throw them into the water. I do not know the African names of the children my Intended killed, so I make up names for them. "This page is for you, Sunshine. This is for you, Shadow. Here, Morninglark, I give these words to you." I can not give them back their lives, but I can give them my love. Maggie would say that it is not enough, and she would be right. But she would be wrong, too.
I realize suddenly that it is her curse to believe that there is only one way to love and it is my curse to recognize that there are two. The shining light offers no sanctuary for doubt, but the dark heart--it has room enough for all things.
We reach landfall in the hour before sunset. The compound which my Intended established has grown in the year since his death. The skulls have been removed. There are real streets and real buildings. Some of the natives wear European style clothes. There is even a woman, the wife of the Company Agent. She is glad to see us, especially me.
"You do not know how I have longed for a female companion," she exclaims.
Behind her, stands a native woman, her presence a silent reproach.
I am lead to a room that has been furnished like a British drawing room. I am served tea in china cups and biscuits from a tin. I have come one thousand miles only to find myself back home.
My collar begins to feel tight. I loosen it but get no relief. I unbutton the front of my dress. My hostess looks alarmed. "Are you suffering from fever?" she asks. "Shall I fetch the doctor?"
"Yes," I reply, to get her out of the room. The moment she is gone, I slip through the far door and out the back of the house. There are drums beating in the distance. They are telling me something that I do not want to hear, but the message is clear all the same. Death is coming. Not for me. Not for Maggie. But it is coming.
I run to the River. Maggie is there, supervising the unloading of our luggage. "Careful," she snaps as two men fumble with my trunk of books. "Don't get it wet!" She is usually so polite to the natives. Why the anger? What is so special about my books.
She sees me and frowns. "What are you doing here?"
I simply stare. The truth is written all over her face. How can the others not see?
Time passes. A minute? An hour? She tries to take me by the arm. I pull away and begin running towards the plank that connects the steamer to the shore. Maggie, in her trousers, is faster than me. She grabs me by the waist and knocks me to the ground. As we hit the dirt, the earth trembles. Flames rise into the sky followed by a wall of water which drenches us.
I rub my eyes and peer at the River. The steamer is gone. All that remains of the ship are a few pieces of burning timber. All that remains of the crew are a few corpses which float face down in the water . A wave washes a severed arm onto the shore.
As the Europeans in the Compound run and shout, natives appear from the jungle. They take charge of my trunk, carrying it into the trees. They move quickly, quietly so as not to attract attention. When they pry open the lid, they will not find leather bound volumes, for my books went up in the explosion. Inside the trunk there are weapons, rifles, ammunition, explosives. If I had placed them there myself I could not be more certain.
Next they come for Maggie and me. I do not resist, because there is nothing I can do now. It is too late. The damage has been done. Maggie is a murderer. We slip away into the jungle. No one sees us leave. Later, when they realize that we are gone, they will whisper about abduction. They may even send out a search party, though they will not search too hard. After a while, people will convince themselves that we were on board the ship when it exploded, and they will call off the search.
I can see the future as clearly as I see Maggie. Her cheeks are flushed. Her short red hair sticks out around her head like a halo of flame. Her eyes pick up the light of the moon and reflect it. She looks so happy. The ghost of her poor dead brother has finally been laid to rest.
Poor girl. I pity her as I pity all things.
She opens her mouth to speak, but before she can utter a word I raise my hand and slap her across the face, first one cheek, then the other. Once I let it out, my anger becomes a tornado. I tear at her hair. I kick her in the stomach. The others pull me away from her and restrain me. I can feel the tension within them. If she gives the word, they will cut my throat and toss my corpse into a ditch.
Rubbing her stomach, she glares at me. "Why did you do that?"
"You know." My voice is the growl of an angry she-wolf.
"What? All the natives were off the ship when we blew her up. Only the soldiers were still on board--Ah! That is it!" Her expression hardens. "This is war. They were soldiers. They knew the risks. I am not going to pretend to feel sorry that they are dead, not even to please you."
She turns to her rebel companions and begins to speak to them in their tongue. Her tone is almost conversational as she and they discuss their next move. When did she join their cause? During our journey through the jungle? Before that, in the days we spent on the coast? Or did Samuel, the captain's son recruit her? Does it matter? She is doing what she must. She is being true to her nature, as I must be true to mine.
Gradually, my captors slacken their grip on me. When they are deeply engrossed in their discussion, I turn and slip away into the dense undergrowth.
The River is calling to the darkness within me. Now that the steamer is gone, there is nothing standing between me and the water. The souls of the dead men call to me. Though it is too late to save them, I can join them. The River is wide enough, deep enough to hold us all. Our tears will hardly be felt in that immense, swirling artery of water. It will carry our corpses to the ocean, and though our hearts have ceased to beat, the rhythm of the waves will sustain us.
Dense undergrowth snags my long, full skirt, slowing me. I tear the fabric away. My veil is gone. My hair streams down my back. If anyone is pursuing me, they will find my trail easy to follow. I must hurry. I must not stop to listen to the sounds of night, the birds which call, the panthers which growl, the mosquitoes that whine. I must not pause to stare into the luminesce eyes which watch me from a low branch of a tree. I must not let the scent of night blooming flowers fill my head driving out rational thought. I must not...
But you must
a voice says to me from the darkness. It is the little carved idol.
She is waiting.
The shadow unfolds into a woman. Tall, dark, with hair like wool. Golden bracelets encircle her wrists and ankles. Her face is shaped like a heart, a perfect black heart.
We stare at each other mutely. The jungle falls silent. There is a cry, faint as a kitten. The woman glances once over her shoulder then back at me. She stares with an intensity close to hatred, though why she should hate me, I can not imagine. I do not know her, though I recognize the eyes. They are the eyes which have watched the steamer for days from the jungle.
Again, the silence is disturbed by a thin crying. The woman turns and stoops to pick up something from the ground. The bundle of cloth in her arms wiggles. A small, brown hand emerges.
Holding my breath, I take one step forward. The child is four, maybe five months old. His skin is lighter than his mother's. His nose is longer, his jaw is square. I recognize the nose and jaw. They belong to the man whom I once called my Intended.
Now I know why the woman stares at me. She must have seen my picture. Does she think that I have come to take her son? His son? Does she imagine that I have come to steal her memories of him so that he will be all mine in death as he was not in life?
I would laugh, except that I know that she would not understand. How do I tell her that I do not want him or his memory or his son? How do I tell her that I made this journey to free myself from the man she chose to love?
The answer is on my left hand, on the fourth finger where I wear my engagement ring. Why? He has been dead a year. Why do I still wear his ring? What does it mean? A thin band of gold, a paltry trinket compared to the bracelets that adorn her smooth arms and legs, but to me it has been a shackle.
"Kurtz," I say as slip off the ring. I offer it to her. "Kurtz"
She looks from the ring to my face then back to the ring again. Tentatively, she reaches for the band of gold.
I let it fall into her palm. As the golden rings drops from my fingers, I feel the weight in my heart lift. It is done.
Smiling, I turn my back on her and walk away. If she wishes to, she can kill me now. I have made it easy for her. She would not even have to look me in the eyes. But she will not harm me. The inner voice which has whispered vague hints of things to come is suddenly clear. I know tomorrow and next week and next year as if they have already happened.
The River still speaks to me, but it does not summon me. I have no grief to drown in its dark water. Instead, I walk along the shore for one, maybe two hours. As I walk, I shed a boot here, a stocking there. Before long, I am naked. The leaves caress my bare skin. Fallen petals cushion my feet. For a time, a small bird rides on my shoulder. I am not surprised when it alights or sad when it flies away.
An acrid odor catches my attention. Lifting my chin, I sniff the air. There is a fire nearby. I let the smell of roasting meat guide me. I have grown so accustomed to the drums, that I do not notice them until I begin to feel the beat through the soles of my feet. The drummers are near. I listen and hear them. They speak to me.
Through the trees, I catch a glimpse of firelight. A few more paces bring me to a clearing where women dance around a bonfire while men watch. Their skin is black as night and so slick with perspiration that they seem to be made from liquid onyx and moonlight rather than flesh and blood.
Out of the corner of my eye, I glimpse two steamer chests. Laughter bubbles up in my throat. Maggie and I have taken two different roads to reach the same place. She is a rebel, plotting strategy, calculating acceptable losses and advantage. I am a woman running through the jungle, shedding her clothes. Both of us are on the right path. Both of us are sane.
Naked, I join the dancers. My skin is obscenely pale in the darkness. Those closest to me draw away, as if afraid that I am Death come to claim them. But the music does not stop and the dancers continue to stamp their feet and sway. The fire singes my face and arms. I throw back my head, savoring the heat. It dries the tears which pour down my cheeks as I picture each dead soldier. Mentally, I tear pages from the Book of Psalms, reciting the words from memory, a different psalm for each man.
When I finish the last psalm, I bow my head. When did the music and the dancing stop? How long have they been watching me, listening to me?
A hand closes over my shoulder. Maggie's voice breaks the silence.
"I was worried about you."
"There was no need. I was safe."
She must notice that I am naked, but she does not comment on it. "When you slapped me, I was angry."
"No," I correct her. "When I slapped you, I was angry. You were hurt. I am sorry that I hurt you. I am not sorry that I was angry. That was what killed him."
She frowns. "Killed who?"
"Kurtz. He looked around and saw so much to be sad and angry about that he thought to himself 'I must do something.' As if feeling the sadness and the fury was not real enough. Once he started doing, he could not stop. Nothing he ever did was going to erase the sadness or the pain, but he could not stop doing. And in the end, doing was his undoing." I chuckle at the absurdity of my last words.
Maggie shakes her head. "You are not making any sense. You're delirious."
I laugh. "No, the world is delirious. Maggie, did I tell you that I met a woman? His woman. They had a child together. She loved him. Why did not he stay with her? He had a choice. He could have stayed and found something to live for. Oh Maggie, what if he thought that he was coming home for me? What if I was the thing he wanted to live for? It breaks my heart to think of it--"
"Then don't."
Wise words from one so young. In her own way, she is more wise than me. I allow her to lead me from the fire to the shadows. There are blankets on the ground. A thin clothe is spread over me to keep away the insects. Something brushes my forehead. Did she kiss me? When did I start loving her? Always, I think. We are light and darkness, fire and water, and yet, we were meant to be together, my Beloved and me...
After that, I remember nothing.
Maggie rescued my journal. Did she read it? I have not written anything here that is not true, but I worry that the truth may be too much for her. It drove Kurtz mad and almost did the same to me.
She saved my little carved idol, too. I no longer need him, but I am touched that she thought of me. She knew how much I treasured the statue, even though she could never understand why. To her it was just a piece of wood with sentimental associations. How can I make her understand that it was the statue that freed me?
There were clothes, too. Respectable European clothes. When I woke and found myself dressed in them, I tore them off. I refused to wear anything until a woman presented me with a length of cloth the color of coral. Now, I wander about the native village clothed in sunset, my feet bare, my hair streaming down my back.
Maggie's comrades still look away if their eyes happen to meet mine, but they no longer make gestures to ward off evil. They call me a Holy Woman. They think I bring them good luck. Already, I have warned them of two ambushes. I am looking for M aggie now to tell her that my dreams have shown me a dozen well armed men creeping up from the River at dawn. She will have warriors waiting for them. Their blood will feed the River. I will cry for them. I will cry for Maggie, too, because she can not cry. Her way is not the way of tears.
I have found my Intended. It is not a man. It is not even Maggie, though her comrades refer to me as "his woman." They still think her a man. A strange European man with breasts. It is easier for them to conceive of an anatomic freak than a woman who can fight.
My Intended is not a person. It is not even a place, though I had to come here in order to find it. My Intended is a dream, as rare and beautiful as a blooming rose in winter. My Intended is the reverse of the lie. My Intended is the dark heart which illuminates. My Intended is.
Bio:McCamy writes speculative fiction with elements of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Her long fiction can be read on her web site at http://www.nationwide.net/~taylorjh.
E-mail: taylorjh@nationwide.net
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